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Stored Procedures DO NOT increase performance

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2 Oct 2012CPOL6 min read 486.5K   107   120
Many developers think stored procedures are precompiled so they are faster. I have a different story to tell.

Table of contents

Introduction

I assume that you have clicked on this article / blog because you are an awesome fan of stored procedures (like me) and you cannot see these kind of loose statements. My sincere suggestion would be to read this article once, give a thought on the experiments, and then the comments section is always there to throw bricks at me.

Image 1

Stored Procedures are precompiled so they are faster

Ask any one why he prefers stored procedures as compared to inline queries and most will reply back with a standard statement:

“Stored procedures are precompiled and cached so the performance is much better.”

Let me just explain the above sentence more diagrammatically. When we fire SQL for the first time, three things happen:

  • The SQL syntax is checked for any errors.
  • The best plan is selected to execute the SQL (choice to use clustered index, non-clustered etc.).
  • Finally the SQL is executed.

The above statement states that when you run a stored procedure for the first time it will go through all the above steps and the plan will be cached in-memory. So the next time when the stored procedure is executed it just takes the plan from the cache and executes the same. This increases performance as the first two steps are completely eliminated.

The above statement also says / implies that for inline queries all the above steps are repeated again and again which brings down the performance considerably.

Image 2

The above explanation was pretty valid and true for older versions of SQL Server, but from 2005 onwards, all SQL statements, irrespective of it’s a SQL coming from inline code or stored procedure or from anywhere else, they are compiled and cached.

OK, now walk your talk

Image 3

Image from http://www.stegman.com/site/wp-content/uploads/2011/07/Man-walking-rope.jpg

In order prove the above point I did a couple of experiments. I wrote a simple .NET application which makes calls to SQL Server by using both methodologies, i.e., simple inline SQL and stored procedure.

Below is a simple experiment to prove the same.

We have created two scenarios: one which will run a simple inline SQL as shown below. This SQL goes and queries a simple “Users” table to check if a user exists in the database or not.

C#
SqlCommand objCommand = new SqlCommand("Select * from Users where UserName='"
                                        + UserName + "' and Password='"
                                        + Password + "'", objConnection);

In the second scenario the same inline SQL is wrapped in a stored procedure called “sp_login”.

C#
SqlCommand objCommand = new SqlCommand("sp_Login", objConnection);
objCommand.Parameters.Add(new SqlParameter("UserName", UserName));
objCommand.Parameters.Add(new SqlParameter("Password", Password));
objCommand.CommandType = CommandType.StoredProcedure;

Both these SQLs are fired from the application with a profiler running in the background. We capture two events when we ran the profiler: CacheHit and CacheInsert. The CacheInsert event is fired when the plan is inserted in the cache while CacheHit is fired when the plan is used from the cache.

Image 4

When we ran the experiment with the stored procedure we saw the below results. You can see in the trace below:

CacheInsert” first creates the plan and inserts it into the cache. Once the plan is cached the CacheHit event occurs which means it has taken the plan from the cache rather than recreating it from scratch.

Image 5

When we ran the experiment with inline SQL we saw similar kinds of results. You can see how the CacheHit event is hit after the CacheInsert event is fired.

Image 6

Cheater, change the data?

If you see look at the previous experiment, the data is absolutely the same. The time I change the data as shown in the figure below, you can see it’s no longer using the cache, rather creating new cache entries. 

Image 7 

Let me go ahead and tweak the ADO.NET code to support parameters as shown below.

C#
SqlCommand objCommand = new SqlCommand(
   "Select * from Users where UserName=@userName and Password=@Password", objConnection);
objCommand.Parameters.AddWithValue("@userName", UserName);
objCommand.Parameters.AddWithValue("@Password", Password);

When I capture the cache events in the profiler it is using the cache. You can see in the below figure how first the cache insert event occurs and after that it always hits the cache for the plan rather than recreating it.

Image 8

Dynamic SQL and Dynamic SQL

One of the most confusing terminologies people use is Dynamic SQL. Let’s refine this word further. There are two types of dynamic SQL: one is dynamic SQL and the other is parameterized dynamic SQL.

Image 9

Courtesy: Spiderman 3

Dynamic SQL is of the form as shown below (it can be more dynamic where column names are also built on the fly).

SqlCommand objCommand = new SqlCommand("Select * from Users where UserName='"
                                        + UserName + "' and Password='"
                                        + Password + "'", objConnection);

The above dynamic SQL will probably not use the plan from the cache until auto parameterization helps (http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa175264(v=sql.80).aspx).

If you use parameterized dynamic SQL like below, it will use the SQL plan from the cache as done by stored procedures.

C#
SqlCommand objCommand = new SqlCommand("Select * from Users where UserName=@userName and Password=@Password", objConnection);

objCommand.Parameters.AddWithValue("@userName", UserName);
objCommand.Parameters.AddWithValue("@Password", Password);

In simple words performance of inline parameterized SQL is the same as that of Stored Procedures.

Hmm, what about network traffic?

If you have read so far you must be embarrassed, the way I was when I lost this argument. To counter protect many developers would also argue that network traffic decrease when using stored procedures is less as compared to that for inline SQL.

In simple words if we use stored procedures we just send:

Sp_login 

If we use inline SQL we send the complete SQL which will increase traffic.

SQL
'Select * from Users where UserName=@UserName and Password=@Password'

Must be this is a valid point if we are having many Windows apps pounding on one SQL Server. That can lead to a lot of network traffic if there are a lot of transactions.

In case of web applications where the SQL and the ASP.NET code (in the same data center) are very much near I do not really buy this point out.

As said this is just my personal opinion.

I will still use stored procedures

At the end of the day I will still prefer stored procedures. The choice of choosing stored procedures will not be performance but it will be more from the aspect of security and maintenance. Below are some of the points where stored procedures are definitely a plus over inline SQL.

Abstraction

By putting all your SQL code into a stored procedure, your application is completely abstracted from the field names, tables names, etc. So when you make changes in the SQL, you have less impact in your C# code.

Security

This is the best part where stored procedures again score, you can assign execution rights on users and roles.

Image 10

Maintenance ease

Now because we have centralized our stored procedures any issue like fixing defects and other changes can be easily done in a stored procedure and it will be reflected across the installed clients. At least we do not need to compile and deploy DLLs and EXEs.

Centralized tuning

If we know we have a slow running stored procedure, we can isolate it and the DBA guys can performance tune it separately.

Cursors, temp table complications

Simple TSQLs are OK. But what if you have a bunch of statements with IF, ELSE, Cursors, etc? For those kind of scenarios, again stored procedures are very handy.

References

For further reading do watch the below interview preparation videos and step by step video series.

License

This article, along with any associated source code and files, is licensed under The Code Project Open License (CPOL)


Written By
Architect https://www.questpond.com
India India

Comments and Discussions

 
QuestionThe experiment described has no validity Pin
Member 813970725-Aug-18 6:03
Member 813970725-Aug-18 6:03 
QuestionGood Article Pin
Mohamed Fouad13-May-16 23:49
Mohamed Fouad13-May-16 23:49 
GeneralMy vote of 3 Pin
frikrishna26-Mar-16 18:21
frikrishna26-Mar-16 18:21 
Suggestion[My vote of 2] You might not understand stored procedures as well as you think Pin
PeterNierop12325-Oct-15 21:39
PeterNierop12325-Oct-15 21:39 
QuestionExcellent Pin
jithesh a18-Nov-14 0:28
jithesh a18-Nov-14 0:28 
QuestionGood Arcticle Pin
M Rahul5-Nov-14 22:10
M Rahul5-Nov-14 22:10 
GeneralMy vote of 3 Pin
Santhosh Babu Mahimairaj4-Sep-14 2:41
professionalSanthosh Babu Mahimairaj4-Sep-14 2:41 
Generalvery good Pin
Ewert Bergh5-May-14 1:29
Ewert Bergh5-May-14 1:29 
QuestionYou proved nothing... Pin
Kornfeld Eliyahu Peter2-Apr-14 12:46
professionalKornfeld Eliyahu Peter2-Apr-14 12:46 
AnswerRe: You proved nothing... Pin
Shivprasad koirala2-Apr-14 15:47
Shivprasad koirala2-Apr-14 15:47 
GeneralRe: You proved nothing... Pin
Kornfeld Eliyahu Peter2-Apr-14 18:05
professionalKornfeld Eliyahu Peter2-Apr-14 18:05 
QuestionCursors Pin
ScottGimpel55510-Feb-14 6:00
ScottGimpel55510-Feb-14 6:00 
QuestionStored procedures are a maintenance problem Pin
Jarmo Muukka19-Nov-13 21:08
Jarmo Muukka19-Nov-13 21:08 
GeneralMy vote of 5 Pin
Oshtri Deka28-Jul-13 21:25
professionalOshtri Deka28-Jul-13 21:25 
GeneralMy vote of 5 Pin
TapasU8-Apr-13 19:13
TapasU8-Apr-13 19:13 
QuestionVote 5 Pin
_Dhull 4-Apr-13 19:09
_Dhull 4-Apr-13 19:09 
GeneralMy vote of 5 Pin
_Dhull 4-Apr-13 19:09
_Dhull 4-Apr-13 19:09 
GeneralMy vote of 4 Pin
VijaySai Panchadi28-Feb-13 1:17
VijaySai Panchadi28-Feb-13 1:17 
GeneralMy vote of 4 Pin
kimberly wind21-Feb-13 17:41
kimberly wind21-Feb-13 17:41 
GeneralMy vote of 5 Pin
Varun Sareen22-Oct-12 2:26
Varun Sareen22-Oct-12 2:26 
Gives a solid clarification on inline queries execution and Stored Procedures
QuestionSP are outdated Pin
Thornik11-Oct-12 1:45
Thornik11-Oct-12 1:45 
AnswerRe: SP are outdated Pin
eghetto11-Oct-12 21:14
eghetto11-Oct-12 21:14 
GeneralStored Procedures can Increase performance Pin
t4teacher8-Oct-12 4:21
t4teacher8-Oct-12 4:21 
BugSQL Injection Pin
Richard Deeming8-Oct-12 4:00
mveRichard Deeming8-Oct-12 4:00 
GeneralMy vote of 3 Pin
merlin9813-Oct-12 6:27
professionalmerlin9813-Oct-12 6:27 

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